FINCA International

Last updated

FINCA International
Company type Nonprofit organization
Industry Microfinance
Social enterprise
Research
Founded1984
Headquarters Washington, DC, United States
Area served
Africa
Asia
Eurasia
Latin America
Middle East
Key people
John Hatch, founder, and Rupert Scofield, President and CEO
Products Financial services
Impact investing
Energy
Research
Revenue$339,617,464 (December 31, 2017)
Number of employees
Approximately 10,000 (November 9, 2016)
Website www.finca.org

FINCA International is a non-profit, microfinance organization, founded by John Hatch in 1984. FINCA is the innovator of the village banking methodology in microcredit and is widely regarded as one of the pioneers of modern-day microfinance. With its headquarters in Washington, D.C., FINCA is considered to be one of the most influential microfinance organizations in the world. [1] The name FINCA is an acronym for Foundation for International Community Assistance. [2]

Contents

Countries where FINCA operates

See also

Related Research Articles

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Microcredit</span> Small loans to impoverished borrowers

Microcredit is the extension of very small loans (microloans) to impoverished borrowers who typically lack collateral, steady employment, and a verifiable credit history. It is designed to support entrepreneurship and alleviate poverty. Many recipients are illiterate, and therefore unable to complete paperwork required to get conventional loans. As of 2009 an estimated 74 million people held microloans that totaled US$38 billion. Grameen Bank reports that repayment success rates are between 95 and 98 percent. The first economist who had invented the idea of micro loans was Jonathan Swift in the 1720’s. Microcredit is part of microfinance, which provides a wider range of financial services, especially savings accounts, to the poor. Modern microcredit is generally considered to have originated with the Grameen Bank founded in Bangladesh in 1983. Many traditional banks subsequently introduced microcredit despite initial misgivings. The United Nations declared 2005 the International Year of Microcredit. As of 2012, microcredit is widely used in developing countries and is presented as having "enormous potential as a tool for poverty alleviation." Microcredit is a tool that can possibly be helpful to reduce feminization of poverty in developing countries.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Microfinance</span> Provision of microloans to poor entrepreneurs and small businesses

Microfinance is a of financial services targeting individuals and small businesses who lack access to conventional banking and related services. Microfinance includes microcredit, the provision of small loans to poor clients; savings and checking accounts; microinsurance; and payment systems, among other services. Microfinance services are designed to reach excluded customers, usually poorer population segments, possibly socially marginalized, or geographically more isolated, and to help them become self-sufficient. ID Ghana is an example of a microfinance institution.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Grameen Bank</span> Bank and microfinancer in Bangladesh

Grameen Bank is a microfinance specialized community development bank founded in Bangladesh. It makes small loans to the impoverished without requiring collateral.

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A micro-enterprise is generally defined as a small business employing nine people or fewer, and having a balance sheet or turnover less than a certain amount. The terms microenterprise and microbusiness have the same meaning, though traditionally when referring to a small business financed by microcredit the term microenterprise is often used. Similarly, when referring to a small, usually legal business that is not financed by microcredit, the term microbusiness is often used. Internationally, most microenterprises are family businesses employing one or two persons. Most microenterprise owners are primarily interested in earning a living to support themselves and their families. They only grow the business when something in their lives changes and they need to generate a larger income. According to information found on the Census.gov website, microenterprises make up 95% of the 28 million US companies tracked by the census.

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Village banking is a microcredit and saving methodology whereby financial services are administered locally in a community bank rather than in a centralized commercial bank. Village banking has its roots in ancient cultures and was most recently adopted for use by micro-finance institutions (MFIs) as a way to control costs. Early village banking methods were innovated by Grameen Bank and then later developed by groups such as FINCA International founder John Hatch. Among US-based non-profit agencies there are at least 31 microfinance institutions (MFIs) that have collectively created over 800 village banking programs in at least 90 countries. And in many of these countries there are host-country MFIs—sometimes dozens—that are village banking practitioners as well. The latest developments globally can be seen in South East Asia, where digitization is pacing fast to reach rural areas with hybrid on- and offline solutions.

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Solidarity lending is a lending practice where small groups borrow collectively and group members encourage one another to repay. It is an important building block of microfinance.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Grameen family of organizations</span>

The Grameen family of organizations has grown beyond Grameen Bank into a multi-faceted group of both commercial and non-profit ventures. It was first established by Muhammad Yunus, the Nobel Peace Prize-winning founder of Grameen Bank. Most of the organizations in the Grameen group have central offices at the Grameen Bank Complex in Mirpur, Dhaka, Bangladesh. The Grameen Bank started to diversify in the late 1980s when it began attending to unutilized or underutilized fishing ponds, as well as irrigation pumps like deep tubewells. In 1989, these diversified interests started growing into separate organizations, as the fisheries project became Grameen Fisheries Foundation and the irrigation project became Grameen Krishi Foundation.

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Pride Microfinance Limited (PMFL), is a microfinance deposit-taking institution (MDI) in Uganda. It is licensed by the Bank of Uganda, the central bank and national banking regulator.

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Kashf Foundation is a non-profit organization, founded by Roshaneh Zafar in 1996. Kashf is regarded as the first microfinance institution (MFI) of Pakistan that uses village banking methodology in microcredit to alleviate poverty by providing affordable financial and non-financial services to low income households - particularly for women, to build their capacity and enhance their economic role. With headquarters in Lahore, Punjab, Kashf have regional offices in five major cities and over 200 branches across Pakistan.

References

  1. Kingsbury, Kathleen (April 5, 2007). "Lending a hand". Archived from the original on April 29, 2007. Retrieved April 25, 2007.
  2. "History of FINCA and Microfinance". FINCA. Retrieved December 22, 2021.